For the next three days, the world didn't end.
No gates erupted.
No Void-Tier anomalies cracked the sky.
No black shadow from the depths of the Earth came crawling.
And so—for just a little while—Evon Wang slowed down.
After months of awakening ancient power, dueling sovereign hunters, and carrying a world's worth of expectation, Evon arrived quietly in the city district of Shenzhen, where an old apartment tower still stood, upgraded but familiar.
His parents greeted him at the door.
Jessica Wang, still in her Hunter coat, tried her best to scold him for knocking instead of unlocking the security field.
"You have a world clearance code now. Why ring the doorbell?"
Evon embraced her mid-sentence.
She hesitated—but only for a heartbeat—before hugging him tightly, her chin resting on his shoulder.
"You smell like ozone and ash," she muttered. "Could've at least changed before hugging your mother."
"I fought a continent the other day," he said. "You could let me smell like one."
She swatted the back of his head.
Shen Wang, Evon's father, joined them at the door, slipping a pair of grilled skewers into Evon's hands.
"Barbecue fish from that old market you liked. We had to bribe the vendor to make it the same way they did pre-cataclysm."
Evon took a bite and chewed in silence. For once, he wasn't eating a nutrient tablet in flight.
"Still spicy," he murmured.
"I told her two chilis max."
"She added five," Jessica said with mock smugness, returning to the kitchen. "Says he's immortal now, he can take it."
They laughed—easily, for once.
The apartment was simple. Glossy windows with bamboo-print curtains, a sofa that had seen better years, a holo-projector mounted into a bookshelf filled with physical photo albums.
Evon spent the afternoon on that sofa, shoes off, talking about nothing.
—
"Are your eyes always glowing that much now?" Shen asked over dinner.
"I tone it down when in cities," Evon replied. "Otherwise people complain I look psychic."
"You do. You look like you're reading people's taxes when you look at them," Jessica added.
Evon raised an eyebrow. "That's not how Fate Sight works."
She clicked her chopsticks smugly. "Still creepy."
He smiled faintly and ate quietly.
The meal was warm—a mix of grilled tofu, carrot dumplings, soup noodles and preserved duck that Shen had taken out of a cryo-seal from the pre-gate war days.
"You're really eating that?" Evon asked, watching his father.
Shen bit into the old duck leg slowly and met his son's gaze.
"Time may pass, but flavor is eternal."
Jessica chuckled. "He's been saying that for 900 years."
—
That night, they stayed up late in the living room. No formal security detail, no press alert. They didn't even check the news.
Shen poured out two small glasses of yulian tea with an old bottle warmer. Jessica draped a throw blanket around her shoulders and slipped off her hunter gloves.
The faint sound of city traffic floated up through the window—aircycles darting past neon signs, automated patrol drones circling quietly.
"I should've died that day," Evon said.
There was no emotion in his voice. Just quiet honesty.
"At the crash," Jessica said softly.
He nodded.
"But you didn't," Shen replied.
Evon stared out the window, cups warm in his hands.
"I think someone wanted me to fall asleep… and wake at the right time."
Jessica leaned back. "We always knew it wasn't normal. The way your heartbeat remained stable. The dreams you kept whispering. How your body never decayed."
"You said I whispered their names while I was in a coma."
"Thousands of times," Shen said, folding his arms. "At first we thought it was just memory. Then we started hearing names we'd never heard before in any language."
"I didn't think it was real myself for a while. But the more I reach for them..." He paused. "The more the pieces line up."
Jessica leaned forward, brows softening.
"Evon… is it really worth it? To chase people you haven't seen in nearly a thousand years?"
"They're not just people," he said. "They're part of me. They're connected to the same thread I woke through."
"Then we'll help however we can," Shen said.
Jessica held up her cup in a small toast. "Let's get those girls back. We've got weapons to clean."
Evon managed to smile for real after that—just a quiet one—but real.
—
**Day Two — Memory Lane**
The next morning, Shen insisted they visit what little remained of the old city park near the bay. It had been rebuilt several times, but some of the original pathways still remained.
They walked slowly through the wind-carved trees and hovered briefly over the display pillars showing holograms of the coastal floods from 2082. Overhead, birds born from post-gate evolution flew in wide arcs.
Jessica stopped in front of a blossom tree with blue petals.
"You fell out of that tree once," she said. "You were six, trying to prove you could see the moon first."
"And I broke my arm."
"And cried until we gave you pudding, yes."
They sat on a bench near the roots. For a long stretch, they said nothing.
"Do you wish you'd never awakened?" Shen asked.
"No," Evon said, without pausing. "But I do wonder why it had to be me."
Jessica glanced sideways at him. "You never asked why back then."
"I was too busy living the life I fell into. Now I'm trying to find the one that was taken from me."
Shen stood and walked toward a nearby vendor cart—an old man selling AI-customized tea flavors. He returned with three cups of synth flower-pollen tea.
They sipped in silence again for a while.
"You know," Jessica said, "we could've been bitter. Waiting 982 years for you to wake up."
"But you weren't?"
"No, because we felt it. We felt that you were still alive in some way—same way you feel your goddesses."
Evon didn't respond, but her words settled softly across his chest.
—
That night, Shen showed Evon the old storage unit—hidden deep within Association vaults—where Evon's childhood mementos had been preserved.
A small rubber toy of a dragon. A photo with his first bike. A championship medal from a middle school science fair.
"Even then," Shen said, placing the photo into Evon's hand, "you liked making impossible things work."
Evon stared at the photo. His hair was messy in it. His shirt wrinkled. He was mid-laugh.
"I don't remember this." His voice dipped lower.
"You will," Jessica said beside him. "Now that everything else is waking up."
—
**Day Three — Final Moments**
The final day came quietly. The morning air was clear. Evon stood alone on the rooftop of their building, looking east.
Jessica joined after a few minutes, handing him a thermos of pear-sweet soup.
"You're leaving in a few hours," she said.
He nodded.
"Mongolia isn't close. One lead on a seal?"
"It matches the cadence of Naia's core frequency. Frozen resonance."
Jessica nodded. "Sounds like her."
He turned to her.
"Are you worried?"
She thought for a moment.
"Yes. But I was more worried when you weren't here."
They sat together for a while in the sun until Shen arrived with a light chuckle.
"You're not leaving until I beat you just once in sparring."
Evon raised an eyebrow. "You haven't landed a clean hit on me once."
Shen smirked. "Then what better time to change history."
Downstairs, the apartment rang with the sound of wood sparring sticks and soft laughter—mixed with collisions, light footwork, and breathless moments of joy between father and son.
By lunch, they were both out of breath, and Jessica presented Evon with a pendant—an old silver ring tied to a red thread.
"This belonged to your grandmother," she said, slipping it into his hand. "She gave it to us when we had you. Called it a token of impossible hope."
Evon looked down at it.
Then he bowed, just slightly, palms together, head dipped.
His voice was soft.
"Thank you. For waiting for me."
Jessica smiled gently.
Shen placed his hand on Evon's shoulder.
"We didn't wait," he corrected. "We lived until you came home."
That evening, Evon left quietly, boarding the private skyrunner headed to Mongolia.
_____________________